Last week, I had a very special visitor at work: my baby brother, P. Having stopped by for help with his best man speech, he got a taste of how busy my day can be; in the half hour spent in my office, we were interrupted by two department heads, one family member, and a distraught resident from our memory support unit. Accompanied by an exceptional staff member, E was beside himself – his mom had passed away and he didn’t have a ride to her funeral. On top of that, he had nothing good to wear.

Not surprising to my brother, I shot up from my desk. Shannon and I consoled our friend and assured him we would gladly drive him to the funeral – we’d obviously have been attending regardless. I fixed his collar and we tweaked his outfit, confirming he looked just fine and there was no need to worry. She pulled up Mom’s “obituary” and E found comfort in hearing that arrangements had been made and he wouldn’t miss a thing. Though still sad, he calmly returned to his apartment and thanked us profusely.

While unfazed by our reaction, P was confused about what he’d heard. “Was that real?” he asked. Could a man in his eighties have just lost his mom? “To him it was!” we replied. Obviously, E’s mom didn’t really just pass away. In fact, it’s been so long since her death that no such online obituary exists. Thankfully, Google helped us find the names of E’s relatives, whose mention helped to calm his nerves.

I write frequently about the importance of validating feelings. Naomi Feil, who basically grew up in an elder care facility, developed validation therapy after witnessing firsthand how ineffective (and even detrimental) other approaches to dementia care could be. Reality orientation, for example, was widely used for years to essentially bring demented people back to reality – to present orienting information like the current time and place in order to eliminate confusion. It sounds pretty promising until you really consider its consequences: if E is truly convinced he’s in his fifties and his mother just passed, me telling him he’s an 83 year old resident at an assisted living whose mom died thirty years ago would not only make no sense, it’d make me a crazy liar.

Validation therapy, on the other hand, is based on the general principle of validation, or the acceptance of the reality and personal truth of another’s experience (even if it’s not accurate). Its techniques aim to help individuals with dementia be as happy as possible; when their struggle is respected and validated by a trusted person, withdrawal is halted and dignity restored. Though validation can’t repair damaged brain tissue, it can help lessen anxiety. It can foster trust and even love, & that’s real enough for us.